Purkake

@Raithe: You're just mad, because they didn't ask the questions you wanted. Just like Inception. Yup, pretty much. Now I can't stop thinking about how much crazier Inception would have been if an insane Japanese guy had written it. If convoluted storylines were a hallmark of great writing then no doubt there would be many other games praised by their writing. No, the fact that with a story that complicated the game was still effective, and the characters relatable is testament to their talent. Plus if we are calling out a game for inane nonsensical crap we may as well take down the whole genre. Oh, I'm not doubting Kojima's talent, if you can make the whole thing hold together until after you've finished it, you're a head above most of the genre. That said, don't even try to throw MGS on the same pile as the whole genre. There's crazy and then there's a specific kind of mind-bending insanity that will make your nose bleed when you attempt to go back and put it all together after you've finished it. Kojima's talent isn't at story writing, he's a genius at story presentation.

I guess you're beyond help then

I hear lowering one's expectations and just having fun has been known to make things easier to enjoy. Big Rigs would probably entertain me for much longer than your average racing game these days. @Sannom: I'm using the expanded, English definition of the word in this case.

Just like Inception. Yup, pretty much. Now I can't stop thinking about how much crazier Inception would have been if an insane Japanese guy had written it.

I'm not going to argue with you about DS1/2, but looking at the previous pages, I wasn't the only one who quite enjoyed Space Siege.

I like to think that the whole series is commentary on video games stories/plots and how adding emotional value can make the most inane and nonsensical crap seem like the greatest story ever told.

Well obviously they're not all crabby DS fanboys, but that was certainly one of the sentiments on the old Gaspowered Games boards. It may not be the greatest of games(neither were the DS games), but certainly doesn't deserve the outright dismissal a lot of people are/were giving it.

But how would anyone ever know?

I don't know, the special missions or whatever in MW2 were pretty hard.

It's not all black and white here, you can call SS simple, DS3 slightly less simple and DS1/2 the masterpieces of complexity. We live in a world of infinite shades of gray, my Hungarian friend.

Haven't you noticed? All the Modern Warfares and whatnot have tried to tell deep personal stories about war, it's just mixed in with all the dudebro stuff and no one actually cares.

So what about Halo?

I wasn't talking about simplicity, I was talking about the best shooting mechanics. Unfortunately I haven't played Homefront, so I can't comment on that, but Crysis 2 is hardly an example of a non-military game.

It's more the mechanics than the theme. Most of the military shooters have just diluted the shooter formula down the basics in terms of story, atmosphere, characters. If you managed to copy all the mechanics over to any other genre, you'd probably do okay and you might even be able to slip a few extra things in there to make it a little more exciting. A lot of the shooter/X hybrids just can't match the mechanics of the straight-up shooters and have to sink or swim on the strength of their other features. I'd say one of the problems with the hybrids is the reductionist approach where the developer waters down the existing shooter mechanics to accommodate the abilities/classes/progression instead of thinking outside the box and adding various options to the (great) already existing mechanics. A part of it probably comes down to having to program decent AI and put more focus on tactical gameplay, which probably takes much more effort than the default scripted approach.

How so? I'm talking about the people who(like fans of some other franchises) can't take off their rose-tinted glasses and see everything that isn't exactly 100% more of the same as blasphemy.

I don?t believe that a work of art can be objectively good. I do believe that a book can be evaluated in regards to cultural, genre, and period expectations. You can also ask yourself if a book is consistent in regards to itself or the larger series it exists in. That's kind of what I was getting at, because everyone was just going on about the "writing". You'll need to take into account a number of variables, especially the intended genre and the time period.

Spoken like a true butthurt DS grognard. Thanks for proving my point

Obviously, but the canon femshep will be femshep in name only!

Even the default ME2 one looks better than any of those six

Where's all this Space Siege love coming from? I've never played it, but as far as I understand it's pretty universally hated. =P Nah, it's just the perpetually butthurt DS grognards.

I guess that's bad? Oh well.

Yes, I was referring to Ser Grandfather as well.

You are aware that they remade that a few years ago, right?

Great to get more people to try it. Not many sci-fi themed action RPGs out there.

They do, in the end. That's debatable. They change, a little, in the end. There is one good thing about the Mereen bits, but I won't spoil it.